Peek inside for-sale home of 1930s California governor

Jan. 24, 2014

Updated 12:29 p.m.

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The home that once belonged to former California Gov. Frank Merriam is offered for $1,450,000 in Long Beach on Wednesday. The two-level craftsman home includes six bedrooms. ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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A bathroom on the top floor of the home that once belonged to former California Gov. Frank Merriam in Long Beach on Wednesday. The house includes four and a half bathrooms, six bedrooms, a kitchen, dining room, and a living room. ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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The formal dining room features two large window openings that allow substantial light into the home in Long Beach on Wednesday. The house includes four and a half bathrooms, six bedrooms, a kitchen, dining room, and a living room. ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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An upstairs bedroom with its hardwood floors is seen inside the home that once belonged to former California Gov. Frank Merriam in Long Beach. The two-level craftsman home includes six bedrooms. ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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The kitchen area inside the house that once belonged to former California Gov. Frank Merriam in Long Beach on Wednesday. The two-level craftsman home includes six bedrooms. ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

The home that once belonged to former California Gov. Frank Merriam is offered for $1,450,000 in Long Beach on Wednesday. The two-level craftsman home includes six bedrooms.ANIBAL ORTIZ, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

California Gov. Frank Merriam climbed the state's political ladder while living in Long Beach.

The Iowa transplant eventually spent the remaining years of his life here until his death in 1955.

Beyond his political legacy, he left a home that has been in his family ever since.

That home, at 20 Lindero Ave., was put up for sale just before the holidays, and it is possibly headed out of the family's hands for the first time.

The two-level, 3,641-square-foot, Craftsman-style home has six bedrooms and 4½ bathrooms.

Other features include formal living and dining rooms and a large eat-in kitchen.

Many of the home's spacious rooms have hardwood floors that were covered by carpet for the past 50-plus years.

A one-bedroom apartment sits over a pair of two-car garages; the home also has a separate laundry facility .

One of the most interesting aspects of the property's sale is that the owners are offering for consideration the transfer of its oil rights, which, according to listing agent Todd Turley with Main Street Realtors, represent nearly $1,200 a month in income.

The interior matches that of the bungalows so common to Long Beach, but the outside resembles a prairie style for which architect Frank Lloyd Wright is so famous.

It's unknown if the famous architect designed the Merriam house.

Built about 1910, it was listed for $1.45 million.

It's in escrow with an investment group, but Turley said he has backup offers.

He wouldn't divulge the size of the offer that put the home in escrow.

The occupant and seller of the home is Merriam's granddaughter, Hope Merriam, who is 84 and is moving to Arizona with her daughter, who lived in the apartment on the property.

Merriam, a Republican, is perhaps most famous for soundly defeating Democrat Upton Sinclair in the 1934 general election for the governor's post.

Sinclair, author of myriad books, including “The Jungle,” was also known for criticism of journalism at the time.

Merriam was a former newspaper editor and later an owner and publisher of a newspaper.

Already an accomplished politician in Iowa, Merriam came to Long Beach in 1910 and reportedly later worked in the advertising department of the Long Beach Press newspaper.

In 1916, he was elected to represent Long Beach in the Assembly, and several years later was elected to the state Senate, serving several terms in both houses.

Elected lieutenant governor in 1932, Merriam became California's 28th governor when Gov. James Rolph died of heart failure.

He was elected governor in 1934, serving until 1939.

According to the state's official online library of governors: “As governor, he waged a war against corrupt lobbyists and appointed a committee to investigate them. His archenemy was the notorious lobbyist Artie Samish, whose power was so great he scorned Merriam and called him ‘California's behind-the-scenes' governor.”

Merriam, who was born Dec. 22, 1865, in Hopkinton, Iowa, died in the home on April 25, 1955, according to the library.

Turley said some might have been interested in the home because of its history, but its best aspect is the Bluff Park neighborhood in which it sits.

“It's got partial ocean views, and it's all about the neighborhood,” said Turley, who lives just a few homes away.

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